E. V. LUCAS

Evening Star, Issue 23113, 12 November 1938, Page 23

E. V. LUCAS

The last volume of essays by E. V, Lucas, published soon after his death contains one on ‘ Carnations.’

“Those in authority,” he writes, “ once seriously considered placing me with a horticulturist at OBarnham, in Sussex. This was many, many years a rr o , and in the intervening time much water has run beneath the bridges and much ink has been spilt; yet only the other day, on a too short visit to the Cote d’Azur, which was azure indeed, I was wondering if 1 could start to be contented and even wealthy as a cultivator of carnations.

“ All the wav from Gagnes to Cap d’Antibes, and inland up towards Grasse, there are acres of glasshouses containing carnations, red, yellow, white, pinlk. and mingled, which someone has to grow for the vases of the Riviera, of Paris, and of London. Why should not that someone be myself? To watch carnations growing, and to inhale their sweetness, must be a very pleasant proceeding, especially as it entails residence down there, where the sky seems always to bo blue. Why should not I do it?

“One would live in a villa—l should live in a villa —only a day from London and fog and damp and cold, under the warm sun. surrounded by cypresses and bougain-villsea and mimosa and lizards. Every now and then one would I would —walk between the fragrant rows of carnations, indicating to others which of them should be picked and dispatched, and then in due course one would receive—l would receive—money for them. Money. What an existence! 1 can see nothing wrong with it, except, one night, two extra degrees of frost; but that is a risk worth taking. “ All the same. 1 should be out of England, and could I endure that? No, I couldn't.”